Does Adding Salt To Your Ice Help Chill Your Beer?

You've undoubtedly heard that adding salt to your cooler can get your beer slushy. We decided to do a little test. You have room temperature beer, and you're thirsty now. Can salt help? If so, how much?

We punched a hole in the top of the can, and inserted the thermocouple so it was close to the center of the can. Then the can was buried in the cooler with plain ice for 30 minutes while we logged the temperature data. Next we removed the first can, dumped a packet of salt in the cooler, mixed it with the ice, and buried a fresh can.